Installing Slackware 11.0 on An HP Pavilion dv8000

First of all, I have to tell everyone how great of a distribution Slackware is. I have personally sampled (meaning that I downloaded, installed, and ran for a trial period) at least 50 different distributions. It seems that, no matter how fancy a new distribution is, I always find myself returning to Slackware. I have to admit, it doesn't have a lot of the eyecandy and user-friendly features of other mainstream distributions right off the bat, but you could add them if you wanted to. Among my reasons for liking Slackware so much are:

• It's the fastest (by default) I've used
• Stability
• Security
• Educational value

Now that we have a little background as to why I like Slackware so much, let's move on to the installation, shall we? To make it a little more simple, I'm just including the notes that I took while installing.

• Insert disc 1

• Boot Menu: Hit enter to boot with default options

• Select keyboard map: Enter for default US

• Login as root

• Check partition scheme: # fdisk /dev/hda

  Here are some useful commands to get around in fdisk:

  • p to print partition table
  • d to delete, followed by parition number
  • c to create; primary/extended; start sector; end sector
  • a to toggle bootable flag
  • w to write parition table
  • q to quit

• # setup

• ADDSWAP to activate swap partition

  • select your swap partition and hit ok
  • choose whether you wish to check for bad blocks while preparing the swap partition [no]
  • hit ok when your swap partition has been configured

• Choose your root (/) parition

  • Select the proper partition from the list and hit select
  • Choose your formatting type
    • Format: Quick format with no bad block checking
    • Check: Slow format that checks for bad blocks
    • No: No, do not format this partition
    • [ FORMAT ]
  • Choose filesystem
    • ext2: Standard Linux Ext2 Filesystem
    • ext3: Ext3 Journaling Filesystem
    • reiserfs: ReiserFS Journaling Filesystem
    • [ REISERFS ]
  • Add other paritions and follow the same process as above, specifying the mount point
  • Hit ok when the partitions have been setup successfully

• Specify whether you'd like any existing FAT or NTFS partitions to be mounted in Linux

  • [ YES ]
  • Select the partition
  • Specify the mount point

• Hit ok when the FAT and NTFS partitions have been setup

• Choose your installation source

  • Install from a Slackware CD or DVD
  • Install from a hard drive partition
  • Install from NFS (Network File System)
  • Install from a pre-mounted directory
  • [ CD or DVD ]

• Choose the CD/DVD device

  • auto: Scan for the CD or DVD drive (recommended)
  • manual: Manually specify CD or DVD by device name
  • [ AUTO ]

• Select the package sets you'd like to install and hit ok

• Select prompting mode

  • full Install everything (3+ GB of software, recommended)
  • expert Choose individual packages from interactive menus
  • menu Choose groups of packages from interactive menus
  • newbie Use verbose prompting (and follow tagfiles)
  • custom Use custom tagfiles in the package directories
  • tagpath Use tagfiles in the subdirectories of a custom path
  • [ FULL ]

• Specify your kernel

  • bootdisk Use the kernel from the installation bootdisk
  • cdrom Use a kernel from the Slackware CD or NFS mount
  • floppy Install a zimage or bzimage from a DOS floppy
  • skip Skip this menu (use the default /boot/vmlinuz)
  • [ CDROM ]

• Re-insert disc 1

  • Select your kernel
  • [ /cdrom/kernels/sata.i/bzImage ]

• Make a bootdisk

  • Create Make a Linux bootdisk in /dev/fd0
  • Skip Skip making a bootdisk
  • [ SKIP ]

• Modem configuration [ NO MODEM ]

• Specify whether you'd like to start hotplug/udev at boot [ YES ]

• Install the bootloader, LILO

  • simple Try to install LILO automatically
  • expert Use expert lilo.conf setup menu
  • skip Do not install LILO
  • [ SIMPLE ]

• Choose your frame buffer mode for LILO [ standard ]

• Pass the kernel a parameter if you have an IDE CD/DVD-RW drive

  • [ hdc=ide-scsi ]

• Select LILO destination

  • Root Install to superblock (not for use with XFS)
  • Floppy Install to a formatted floppy in /dev/fd0 (A:)
  • MBR Install to Master Boot Record (possibly unsafe)
  • [ MBR ]

• Select your mouse type [ IMPS2 ]

• Specify whether you'd like to start GPM at boot [ NO ]

• Specify whether you'd like to configure your network

  • [ YES ]
  • Enter your hostname
  • Enter your domain name
  • Specify IP setup
    • static IP Use a static IP address to configure ethernet
    • DHCP Use a DHCP server to configure ethernet
    • loopback Set up a loopback connection (modem or no net)
    • [ DHCP ]
  • Specify DHCP parameters
  • Verify and accept network configuration

• Specify services to start at boot time

  • rc.cups
  • rc.httpd
  • rc.mysqld
  • rc.pcmcia
  • rc.samba
  • rc.scanluns
  • rc.sendmail
  • rc.syslog
  • rc.sshd

• Specify whether you'd like to try out some screen fonts [ NO ]

• Specify whether your machine's clock is set to local time or UTC/GMT [ NO ]

• Select timezone

• Select your default desktop [ KDE ]

• Set a root password

• Reboot

• Login as root

• Add a new (normal) user: # adduser

• Configure XWindows

  • # xorgcfg
  • save the configuration to /etc/X11/xorg.conf

• Logout and back in as the new user

• Bring up the GUI

  • $ startx

Begin using your system!!